When
sharing with catholics the wonderful news about the finished work of the Lord Jesus
Christ on the cross for the sins of the world, one of the most tragic and miserable
deceptions that many of them have blindly bought into is their worship and idolization
of the eucharist.

Breaking
bread is something that all Bible believers cherish and take very seriously, especially
after reading Paul's solemn admonition not to come to the Lord's table with any unconfessed
sin in our hearts (1 Cor. 11:23-34). However, communion is only for those of us that
have already been saved from all of our past, present, and future sins; and as such
we do so in gratitude for and remembrance of the terrible price that Christ paid for
us in dying for our sins to save us from the wrath of God, not in order to 'be saved'
or to 'stay saved.'

For
catholics, however, it is something they must do in the 'hope' of being saved and
staying saved. So, for them it's rather simple: no priest, no mass. No mass, no salvation!
And it's also something that they must continue to do right up until they die, otherwise
all the 'good' that they've done in their lives will be wiped away upon death. Without
meaning to sound crude, it's a bit like a 'pay-as-you-go' situation, a bit like buying
'credit' for their phone in order to use it. Translated, this means that they have
to keep going to mass in order to 'stay saved.'

In
John 6, which I covered point by point in another article,
Jesus makes it very clear that when a person eats His flesh and drinks His blood,
they have (present tense) everlasting life.

"Whoso
eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, hath eternal life; and I will raise him up
at the last day."

The
above verse proves that eating the Lord's body means one already haseverlasting
life (present tense) and affirms that this is no mere reference to sitting down and
breaking bread each week (I’ll have more to say on this later).

One
writer offered the following:

"In
ancient ritual blood sacrifices (in pagan religions) the worshipper must consume the
blood of the victim as a sacrifice. This idea was incorporated in such manner that
now the communing believer takes the bread (the body of Christ) into his own flesh
in this the supreme and highest moment of Christian worship. This becomes the central
mystery of the Christians’ faith and practice eating the body of Christ."

Up
until the 12th century, many popes and church councils had differing views as to the
necessity of the mass. For example, Gregory I placed an anathema and
automatic excommunication on anyone who didn't participate in this unbiblical and
non-bloody sacrifice. Yet Innocent III said that all those who taught that it was
necessary and essential to attend mass would be excommunicated. (Also, some church "fathers," like
the above popes, believed in the eucharist being literal, divine and essential to
salvation, while others considered it only to be symbolic, and no more than that.)

Catholics
believe their priests have magical powers to change a wafer and wine (not unleavened
bread and fruit juice, both being Scriptural) into the literal body and blood of the
Lord Jesus Christ before 'crucifying' Him afresh, and the Scripture that is commonly
misused and misunderstood to 'affirm' this is John 6:51-63:

"I
am the living bread which came down from heaven: if any man eat of this bread, he
shall live for ever: and the bread that I will give is my flesh, which I will give
for the life of the world. The Jews therefore strove among themselves, saying, How
can this man give us his flesh to eat?
Then Jesus said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except ye eat the flesh
of the Son of man, and drink his blood, ye have no life in you. Whoso eateth my flesh,
and drinketh my blood, hath eternal life; and I will raise him up at the last day.
For my flesh is meat indeed, and my blood is drink indeed. He that eateth my flesh,
and drinketh my blood, dwelleth in me, and I in him. As the living Father hath sent
me, and I live by the Father: so he that eateth me, even he shall live by me. This
is that bread which came down from heaven: not as your fathers did eat manna, and
are dead: he that eateth of this bread shall live forever. These things said he in
the synagogue, as he taught in Capernaum. Many therefore of his disciples, when they
had heard this, said, This is an hard saying;
who can hear it? When Jesus knew in himself that his disciples murmured at it, he
said unto them, Doth this offend you? What and
if ye shall see the Son of man ascend up where he was before? It is the spirit that
quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing: the words that I speak unto you, they are
spirit, and they are life."

This
kind of Biblical interpretation is called letterism. The concept is quite simple:
every passage in the Bible (if one is not careful) ends up being interpreted literally,
resulting in many problems, if this is taken to the extreme.

The
Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day
Saints (Mormons)
have also fallen prey to this theological blunder!

For
example, in the above piece of Scripture, the Jewish Messiah is speaking to His Jewish
disciples and others present (never forget the historical and religious context) in
their Jewish synagogue, and He tells them:

"Whoso
eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood hath(present tense)eternal life;
and I will raise him up at the last day."

According
to catholic teachings, no catholic is entitled to have any assurance of
salvation, much the same way that Muslims don't either have any assurance that their
sins are forgiven. Should they die at any moment, their religion offers them no guarantee
that they will go straight to be with the Lord, even though the above text is crystal
clear that salvation is eternal and given to those that eat His flesh and drink His
blood. Once again, Rome is proven to be teaching falsehoods on matters of one's eternal
and unconditional salvation.

May
I also take a moment to remind the reader that Jewish culture forbade the drinking
of blood (animal or human) before the law, during the law, and after the law (Lev.
17:11-14.) So, obviously, Jesus would not teach against His own law while the Jews
were still living under the Jewish law (Acts 15:28-29).

Some
years after this event, Peter would say: "I have never eaten any thing that is common
or unclean" (Acts 10:14). Yet, according to Rome, he had done this but didn't know
what he was talking about!

As
catholic doctrine desperately needs to affirm John 6 as being literal, I find it rather
odd that other verses, such as Matt. 5:29 "If thy right eye offend thee, pluck it
out, and cast it from thee," are not interpreted
literally, but only metaphorically. (One church leader, Origen, did foolishly mutilate
himself, when reading this Scripture.)

So,
how should Matt. 5:29 be correctly understood and interpreted? Jesus is warning His
Jewish audience about the drastic consequences of unrepentant sin (Rom. 12:1 should
be cross-referenced here). Correctly, nobody within catholicism or Biblical Christianity
would take this verse to be literal but metaphorical, which of course is the only
correct way to exegete it.

And
what about John 6:54? Well, Scripture with Scripture, and we read how some of the
unbelieving Jews, when hearing about eating and drinking Christ's body, later complained
(vs. 61). This is reminiscent of what happened with Moses and his followers, when
they were still wandering in the wilderness (Ex. 16:2). Also from the same chapter,
we read about the "Bread of Heaven," which God gave as a test to Israel to see who
would obey His laws or not.

John
6 comes to its natural completion, with the false disciples departing from Jesus,
even though He made it clear in vs. 63 that His words weren't literal. They had already
made up their minds, however, and "walked no more with Him," and with this, Christ
allowed them to depart permanently (John 6:66; 1 John 2:19).

So
then how should one understand what Jesus means when He says they must eat Him and
drink Him? The most sensible and logical conclusion for any honest and open-minded
person to come to would be to understand this as being metaphorical. Therefore, the
Lord was underscoring the fact that He would soon die and taught His followers that
they would need to partake of this spiritualmemorial, i.e., believe in Him
and on Him, if they wanted to be saved (John 1:12).

Two
other things should be said about the eucharist:

1)
If receiving it (pre-Vatican
II) warrants eternal life, then grace through faith alone is thrown out
and works for salvation is taught alongside it, something that the cults believe.
Please also remember that communion hadn't yet been officially instituted by Christ.

2)
Today's catholic church (post-Vatican II) no longer holds to the urgent need for catholics
to take communion in order to be saved; for they state that Muslims
and Jews can be saved without any faith or repentance in Christ.

No
sane person would take a literal interpretation of other Scriptures such as "Whosoever
drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst" (John 4:14); "I am
the living bread which came down from heaven: if any man eat of this bread, he shall
live for ever" (John 6:51); "I am the door" (John 10:7), and finally, "He
shall cover thee with his feathers, and under his wings shalt thou trust: his truth shall
be thy shield and buckler"
(Ps. 91:4).
This is known as letterism. Rather, these verses are understood figuratively, based
on the loving understanding that God does and will look after His own and will feed
those that believe in Him literally and spiritually.

Thus,
redeemed sinners will never thirst again if they feed on Him and His word daily. And
we know that God is not a bird (Ps. 91:4), but is a Spirit (John 4:24) and is also
invisible (Col. 1:15).

Later
in the Bible we read how Paul ridiculed his pagan audience in Acts 17:25, when he
totally dismantled their nonsensical belief:

"Neither
is [God] worshipped with men's hands [out goes transubstantiation], as though he needed
any thing, seeing he giveth to all life, and breath, and all things."

One
should also read Acts 19:26-27 where Paul once again reiterates this position, and
what follows from his pagan crowd? Much persecution and violence. Why? Because they,
like Rome, know, that Paul's rebuke of their foolish notion of creating gods, i.e.,
statues, etc, etc, is very bad for business (like church membership and attendance
is for Rome). How times never change!

Lastly,
on this note, 1 Cor. 8:8 is the final clincher that eating food (the wafer miraculously
becoming 'the body of Christ') doesn't save sinners:

"But
meat commendethusnotto God: for neither, if we eat, are we
the better; neither, if we eat not, are we the worse."

Each
of these verses totally obliterates the warped view of the catholic eucharist being
a Biblical doctrine, let alone being able to save lost, ignorant sinners!

May
I say the reason why I have titled this article, "The blasphemy of the mass" is not
only in remembrance of the following victim of this cruel and heretical belief of
a wafer being transformed into the literal body of the Lord Jesus, but because the
church of Rome have created yet another idol and stumbling block to catholics all
over the world, something God detests and will judge them severely for.

Before
I move on, I wish to share with the reader, the following and most profound statement
made by an Anne Askew, whilst been tortured to death for Christ by a catholic bishop,
for failing to submit to the mass:

"I
have read that God made man, but that man can make God, I have never read."

(Anne
was 25 years old when she was tortured and later taken out and burnt alive!)

One
writer had the following to say about the madness of how Rome deals with a wafer:

"If
a Catholic gets the wafer (not the Biblical unleavened bread) stuck in his false tooth,
he is to scrap "Jesus" out of his mouth with a knife or finger, dip Him in water and
drink Him...If a person vomits up the wafer, they must pick up their vomit."

One
last example of this type of wooden and woolly interpretation would be when the Mormons
take 1 Cor. 15:29 literally:

"If
the dead rise not at all? why are they then baptized for the dead?"

After
reading this passage, the founder of the Mormon religion, Joseph Smith, (who was also
a freemason and
witch) started baptising dead people. This form of exegesis is sheer madness, for
when did a dead unrepentant person ever benefit from being baptised after they died?

(The
Mormons have been known to baptise dead people at random, regardless of their religious
backgrounds, and then add their names to their own private computer, which incidentally
has billions of names of people from around the whole world and dating back many years
in their many underground secret tunnels in Utah).

1
Cor. 15:29 simply means that if Christ had not died and then been raised from the
dead, our baptism and faith in Him would be totally in vain.

For
non-catholics, the whole concept of what the mass is was clearly defined and explained
by an archbishop, John F. Whealon:

"Sacrifice
is the very essence of religion. And it is only through sacrifice that union with
the Creator can be perfectly acquired. It was through sacrifice that Christ Himself
was able to achieve this for man. It is only through the perpetuation [continuing]
of that sacrifice that this union may be maintained."

This
part of Scripture is partially true, apart from the perpetual aspect. And then Whealon
goes on to say:

"What
makes the mass the most exalted of all sacrifices is the nature of the victim, Christ
Himself. For the Mass is the continuation of Christ's sacrifice which He offered through
His life and death. Jesus then, is the priest, the offerer of the sacrifice. But Christ
was not only the priest of this sacrifice (of the cross), He was also the victim,
the very object itself of this sacrifice. The Mass is thus the same as the sacrifice
of the cross. No matter how many times it is offered, nor in how many places at one
time, it is the same sacrifice of Christ. Christ is forever offering himself in the
Mass."

(Note:
The mass is performed around 200,000 times a day, all around the globe, meaning Jesus,
according to catholic belief, is continually being 'summoned' down from Heaven like
a bellboy, to be repeatedly 'sacrificed' afresh for the sins of catholics. 'Salvation'
at best is only temporary and most certainly 'conditional', and as such, catholics
are constantly in limbo and fear of dying outside their so-called 'state of grace.')

One
of the greatest blessings for people that had been trapped in organized religion was
the protestant reformation of the 16th century. Much to their credit, the reformers
re-discovered how sinners are saved solely and exclusively by their faith alone in
the shed blood of Christ.

By
Christ's precious and divine blood, anybody who believes on Him and in His substitutionary
death on the cross for their sins can be totally forgiven and pardoned, regardless
of anything they do to 'help' them earn 'favour' with God!

Of
course, such an amazing re-affirmation of God's incredible grace was met with absolute
fury from the priests of Rome because, for them, only they could act as little 'mediators'
between God and man. To cut them out of the equation meant the end of livelihoods
and strongholds over members of their religion.

So,
Rome launched a counter-reformation movement, and one of the first things they did
was to convene in Trent, northern Italy, where they issued over 100 curses on worldwide
non-catholics, which in essence meant eternal Hell fire upon death!

The
council of Trent and its many curses, which is still binding on non-catholics to this
present day, had the following to say to anyone who didn't agree with them on this:

"If
anyone shall say that a blasphemy is ascribed to the most Holy sacrifice of Christ
performed on the cross by the sacrifice of the mass let him be accursed."

Well,
before I respond to the curses promised by Rome, may I remind the reader of one very
important point: if the mass is a continuation of the work of Calvary, than catholicism
has a rather difficult problem. For the Bible says, "And almost all things are by
the law purged with blood; and without shedding of blood is no remission" (Heb. 9:22).

The
mass is a non-bloody sacrifice. The sacrifices in the Jewish temple were bloody. Jesus'
death was bloody. The mass is not. Therefore according to Biblical theology, the mass
is totally nullified, and subsequently worthless!

Now
as far as the 100+ curses, which have so 'lovingly' been placed on all non-catholics
are concerned, all I would say is this: I shall return such curses back to Rome via
FedEx! Because as far as I am concerned, the mass is not needed at all. For we read
the following in the book of Hebrews:

"But
this man [Jesus], because he continueth
ever, hath an unchangeable priesthood. Wherefore he is able also to save them to the
uttermost that come unto God by him, seeing he ever liveth to make intercession for
them. For such an high priest became us, who
is holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners, and made higher than the
heavens; Who needeth not daily, as those high priests, to offer up sacrifice, first
for his own sins, and then for the people's: for this he did once, when he offered
up himself. For the law maketh men high priests which have infirmity; but the word
of the oath, which was since the law, maketh the
Son, who is consecrated for evermore" (Heb. 7:24-28).

"Neither
by the blood of goats and calves, but by his own blood he entered in once into the
holy place, having obtained eternalredemption for
us" (Heb. 9:12).

This
monumental Scripture, which the apostle Paul also affirmed in his epistle to the Romans
(6:10), has a most beautiful connotation to it. Such verses would echo the words of
the Lord as He hung naked on Calvary's cross, "It is finished" (John 19:30).

And
before I move on, please permit me to share what a real curse is, when concerning
false teachers and their teachings, from a true servant of God:

"I marvel that ye are sosoonremoved from him
that called youinto the grace of Christuntoanothergospel: Whichis notanother; but
there be somethattrouble you,andwould pervert the gospel of Christ. Butthoughwe,or an angelfromheaven, preach
any other gospel unto youthan that which we
have preached unto you, let
him be accursed. As we
said before, so say I nowagain, If any man preach any other gospel unto youthanthat ye
have received, let him be accursed"
(Gal. 1:6-9).

So,
it appears the Rome has actually cursed themselves, when seeking to curse true Bible
believers!

To
the observant student of Scripture, none of the above verses state that works of any
kind are necessary for salvation; it's simply by one's faith alone in Christ alone!

So,
what further need do we have to emphasise that the sacrificial aspect of the catholic
mass is a farce and blasphemy in the eyes of God. Jesus has paid the price for the
sin of the world (John 1:29), and no church, group, priest, vicar, guru, prophet,
or god has the right or even the audacity to say or teach otherwise.